WH: Obama undecided on immigration steps

Aug. 3, 2014
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President Obama / Susan Walsh, AP

by David Jackson, USA TODAY

by David Jackson, USA TODAY

White House officials are downplaying stories that President Obama is prepared to take executive action on immigration that would allow millions of undocumented people to stay in the United States.

"The reports you're seeing are uninformed speculation," White House senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer said on ABC's This Week with George Stephanopoulos.

Pfeiffer said Obama asked the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security to "present him with recommendations by the end of the summer." Those agencies have not yet reported back.

"So let's wait and see what those are before we make judgments about them," Pfeiffer said.

Now that Congress is on August recess without any action on immigration, many people are speculating on what Obama might do - or try do - on the politically charged issue.

There will likely be two sets of major Obama announcements in the coming weeks or months: One addressing the recent influx of migrants from Central America, the other on the immigration system overall.

The president is likely to act sooner on the Central American migrants, many of whom are children. In his news conference on Friday, Obama talked about re-allocating resources to move more agents, detention centers, and immigration judges to the border as soon as possible.

Obama is also looking at executive actions on the overall immigration system, given the fact that Congress cannot agree on a "comprehensive" immigration bill.

That assessment is inspiring stories that Obama may consider some of kind of deportation suspension for people who are already in the country illegally.

Such a decision would inspire intense criticism from congressional Republicans, perhaps revving up impeachment talk.

On Fox News Sunday, Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, said: "If the president has decided that he simply is not going to enforce any immigration law ... (then) I think Congress has to sit down and have a serious look at the rest of this Constitution and that includes that 'i' word that we don't want to say."